FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT PARKING GARAGE - PAGE 3

By Alexa Aguilar The following reports were gathered from reports released by the St. Charles Police Department. Three St. Charles women, all 18, were charged with disorderly conduct after they were found throwing fireworks from the top level of the parking garage on Illinois Street on May 10 as people walked below. Two of the women were also charged with resisting police after they ran from police. A 35-year-old St. Charles man was charged with possession of drug paraphernalia, not having a valid driver's license, improper lane usage and not having his lights on when required on May 12 after police noticed him driving at 1:30 a.m. on May 12 without lights on and in the center of the road.

The City Council has authorized a $113,000 contract with Walker Parking Consultants, Elgin, for the design of a parking garage at Schiller Street and Palmer Drive as part of the downtown renewal project. The firm also will look into the suitability of five other downtown sites for multilevel parking facilities.

A green, or energy-saving, parking garage is one of those oxymorons it's hard to get your mind around. You think of a kosher ham, a peacekeeping missile, or the World Series-winning Cubs. Parking garages enable driving, and driving wastes energy. How can a parking garage be green? The question is not academic. At Clark and Kinzie streets, the new Greenway Self Park garage flaunts helix-shaped wind turbines and a cheery logo that pictures leaves, not exhaust, coming out of a car's tailpipe.

A 40-year-old man was stabbed in the abdomen Thursday while waiting for an elevator in a Loop parking garage. Around 12:30 p.m., a man walked up to the victim in the ninth floor elevator lobby at 318 S. Federal St. and plunged a black-handled knife into his midsection, police spokesman Robert Cargie said. The attacker ran down the stairs and got away. The victim took the elevator to the first floor, where he waited in the garage office until paramedics arrived, Cargie said.

Two masked robbers took between $3,000 and $4,000 Thursday morning from a parking garage at 500 N. Kingsbury Ct., which shares its address with the upscale East Bank Club, police said. At about 9:50 a.m. two men in ski masks knocked on the office door of Standard Parking Corp., while the attendant was putting together cash receipts from Wednesday for a bank deposit, said Chicago Avenue District Lt. Thomas Drury. When the attendant asked who was at the door, one of the assailants said, "Jerry," the name of a garage worker, police said.

The City Council has struck a deal to buy a former gas station lot on Main Street for a municipal parking garage for $178,000. The city has been negotiating with Mobil Oil Co. for about a year to buy the property at 215 E. Main St., but the talks broke down earlier this year over environmental cleanup concerns, according to Public Works Director Mark Koenen. Mobil now has agreed to remove underground storage tanks and other contamination from the site. The parking garage will serve the revitalized downtown area and is expected to be completed in about a year.

A man was found guilty in Cook County Criminal Court Friday of raping a woman in the Grant Park underground parking garage on Dec. 28, 1984. James L. Jackson, 28, was on parole for a similar offense when he attacked a young accountant in her car in the parking garage at 350 E. Monroe St. Jackson, 5808 W. Fulton St., had been released six wweks before from prison, having served time for a 1979 rape in a Grant Park garage, said Assistant State's Atty....

The Commission on Chicago Landmarks Thursday approved granting preliminary landmark status to a Loop parking garage. Peter Scales, a spokesman for the Chicago Department of Planning and Development, said early research indicates the Hotel LaSalle Garage, 215 W. Washington St., may be among the first multilevel parking garages built in Chicago. The garage may have served as a model for other multistory parking decks that were erected years later, Scales said. The Hotel LaSalle Garage, designed by architects Holabird & Roche, was built in 1918.

Plan commissioners who recommended approval of a $60 million downtown retail and residential development are urging aldermen to add a floor to a three-story parking garage within the development. The 10-acre project, bounded by Lee, Miner, Perry and Pearson Streets would have 136 condominiums, stores and parking for 734 cars. The parking spaces would meet Des Plaines' requirements, but plan commissioners voted Monday to recommend a fourth story for the garage, adding 140 spaces.

Construction on Michigan Avenue near the Grant Park South underground parking garage will be extended for one block in either direction beginning Tuesday, officials said. Traffic on Michigan has been reduced since July to two lanes between Adams and Van Buren Streets to accommodate reconstruction of the 40-year-old parking garage. Crews hope to open the street by early summer, officials said. The construction zone will be extended for a block in each direction from Monroe Street to Congress Parkway to hasten the roadwork, according to the Chicago Department of Transportation.